News Desk

Former Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said Israel has “lost the war on social media,” describing the online space as the most dangerous and complex arena shaping global public opinion, especially among younger generations.

Speaking at the annual conference of the Jewish Federations of North America in Washington, DC, Hagari urged the creation of a powerful new propaganda apparatus modelled on the capabilities and structure of Unit 8200, Israel’s elite cyber intelligence division. He argued that Israel must now fight “a battle of images, videos, and statistics—not lengthy texts.”

Hagari proposed establishing a unit capable of monitoring anti-Israel content across platforms, in real time and in multiple languages, supplying rapid-response messaging and data to government and media outlets. His plan also calls for the systematic creation of fake online identities, automated bot networks, and the use of unofficial bloggers—“preferably mostly young women”—to shape global perceptions.

He warned that the decisive phase of this battle will unfold a decade from now, when students using artificial intelligence tools search for information on the events of October 7 and encounter “two completely contradictory narratives.”

Hagari, a former navy officer who served in sensitive military roles, became Israel’s top military spokesperson in 2023 before being dismissed from the position earlier this year.

READ: Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait condemn Israeli prime minister’s tour in occupied Syrian territory

LIAM Payne’s sister has paid an emotional tribute on the anniversary of the late star’s funeral.

Pop star Liam tragically died after falling from a third-floor hotel balcony in Buenos Aires in October last year.

Ruth posted an emotional tribute to her brother, one year on from his funeral – with an early image of the siblings together.

Alongside the post, Ruth wrote: “A year ago today, the hardest goodbye I’ll ever have, a funeral I should never have had to plan and every day since, I should have never had to live without him.

“Missing him now is part of breathing, it doesn’t get easier, that’s just a lie to make it feel better: Infinite love, infinite loss.”

Ruth’s post comes after she shared another tribute on the one year anniversary of Liam’s death.

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In an open letter to him, a devastated Ruth wrote: “I underestimated grief, woah, did I underestimate it. I am paralysed by it daily.

“I thought I had felt it before but I know the losses before you were just intense sadness, you are the loss of my life, the one person who l will miss at every single occasion in my life.

“I’d taken for granted that my little brother would be there through life. 

“You shouldn’t have died.”

Ruth also revealed she’s been having a recurring nightmare that places her in Liam’s hotel room moments before his death on that fateful night.

She said, in it, Liam “can’t hear me screaming for you, my brain is locked on your last minutes on this earth, the unaccounted minutes, the minutes I will never have the answers to, the minutes that changed everything.”

Such is the loss, Ruth said that the life of the Payne family has been “extinguished” and is “impossible to mend”.

She continued: “You died which is something that happened, but your absence is something that happens to me everyday before I even open my eyes.”

In gut-wrenching paragraphs she details how she’d love to spend just five more minutes with him and the things she would tell him, from catching up on plans, to listening to the birds and swapping jokes.

Liam’s Last Days

By Scarlet Howes

SEPTEMBER 20: Liam and his girlfriend, Kate Cassidy, arrive in Argentina for a five-day holiday.

OCTOBER 2: The star goes to see ex-bandmate Niall Horan while he is on tour, telling fans on Snapchat: “It’s been a while since me and Niall have spoken. We’ve got a lot to talk about.”

OCTOBER 12: Kate flies back home to Florida after two weeks away, leaving Liam in Argentina.

She tells her followers on TikTok: “Love South America, but I hate staying in one place for too long and we were supposed to be there for five days, turned into two weeks and I was just like, ‘I need to go home’.”

OCTOBER 13: Liam checks into the CasaSur Palermo Hotel alone three days before he died. He was reportedly asked to leave his previous hotel.

OCTOBER 15: Hours before his death, he spends some time with Aldana Serrano, 31, and Lucila Goitea, 27, who arrived at the hotel at about 11.30am local time and left at 4pm, just one hour before he died.

At about 5pm, Liam is said to have been arguing over money with a mystery woman in the lobby, before falling 45ft and landing in the inner courtyard of the hotel.

Ending her letter to Liam, she asks people to remember that there is a family at the heart of the story who have lost someone very dear to them.

She says: “Whilst I am still on my knees struggling to regain balance since my world burned down and every time I try to take a step, something comes and sets fire to all the progress I thought I had made in my mind, in trying to understand where or why Liam isn’t here helping me through this.

“Everyone only seems interested in the public side of this, some sadly seem more interested in the fame they can gain off this, but on the human side people need to remember when they speak, there is a son without his Dad, parents without their child and I am lost without my brother.

“Love always Liam, in every lifetime.”

Liam died shortly after 5pm on October 16, 2024 when he fell from his hotel balcony.

Liam, who was the dad of seven-year-old Bear, shared a post on Snapchat only minutes before his death and showed him and his girlfriend Kate Cassidy looking into a mirror.

The singer-songwriter was staying at Hotel CasaSur in the neighbourhood of Palermo.

Liam had flown to Argentina with girlfriend Kate Cassidy for a five-day holiday, to see his ex-1D bandmate Niall Horan in concert.

Liam extended the trip but Kate returned home to the US.

It is claimed Liam then turned to drink and drugs.

An autopsy confirmed he died from multiple trauma and internal and external bleeding.

A toxicology report revealed alcohol, cocaine and an antidepressant, which would have left him severely impaired.

Ezequiel David Pereyra — who is awaiting trial for allegedly selling the singer cocaine — recently spoke out for the first time from jail.

Pereyra, 22 — locked up in Marcos Paz jail two hours from the capital — claims hotel bosses turned a blind eye to all of Liam’s drug use in October 2024.

He said: “They had him in an isolated bunker and let him do anything he wanted including drugs in the room, and in public areas of the hotel.

“Bosses said he was making them too much money — triple the money.

“But I think the biggest mistake was not calling an ambulance when Payne passed out in the lobby.

“If the hotel had acted differently Liam could have been saved.

“They lifted him by his arms and legs and carried him to the room via the elevator. He should have been kept where he was and an ambulance called.

“But because that day they had many foreign guests checking in they decided to take him to the room in the condition he was in.

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“After that they called police instead of an ambulance. They made the call only after leaving him in the room alone. By the time they were making the call it was already too late.

“What happened was very sad. Liam’s death was truly tragic and could have been prevented.”

Nov. 21 (UPI) — The Dominican Republic’s Constitutional Court struck down legal provisions that criminalized same-sex relationships within the National Police and the Armed Forces.

The ruling invalidates two articles in the justice codes of both institutions that imposed criminal penalties, including prison time, on service members who engaged in same-sex relationships.

The regulations, in place since the mid-20th century, imposed penalties of up to one year in prison for officers and six months for enlisted personnel under the stated aim of “maintaining discipline and institutional morality.”

However, the high court found that the provisions violated fundamental rights, including privacy, equality before the law and the free development of one’s personality.

The decision responds to a direct constitutional challenge filed by Dominican attorneys Anderson Dirocie de León and Patricia Santana. According to the attorneys, the disciplinary codes of the National Police and the Armed Forces violated fundamental rights recognized in the Dominican Constitution and in human rights treaties the country has ratified.

The measure adopted by the Constitutional Court has prompted mixed reactions in the country.

Cristian Gonzales Cabrera, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch, said “for decades, these provisions forced LGBT officers to live in fear of punishment simply for who they are.”

“This ruling is a resounding affirmation that a more inclusive future is both possible and required under Dominican law,” Gonzales said.

Conservative groups in the country, especially those linked to evangelical churches, described the measure as an affront to moral values.

“This ruling is a direct blow to the moral, ethical and spiritual principles that have sustained our nation since its founding. This decision by the Constitutional Court is unconstitutional because it disregards the spirit, value framework and guiding principles established in the Constitution.”

The Dominican Bar Association called the ruling “unfortunate and unnecessary.”

In comments reported by Diario Libre, the association’s president, Trajano Potentini, said the Constitutional Court applied a constitutional test that does not apply to an area that, by its nature, relies on a work ethic, discipline and special subordination inherent to military and police institutions.

In the Dominican Republic, same-sex marriage remains illegal and high levels of stigma toward LGBTQ+ people persist.

With this ruling, the country joins Peru, Ecuador and Venezuela in eliminating similar discriminatory laws and policies that criminalized same-sex conduct among military personnel.

However, activists warn that although the ruling is historic, it does not by itself guarantee a cultural shift within the armed forces.

The judgment, which still must be implemented, marks a milestone in Dominican jurisprudence and could set a precedent for future reforms in other areas of public service.

Nearly a month after an MH-60R Seahawk helicopter and an F/A-18F Super Hornet from the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz crashed somewhere in the South China Sea, recovery efforts are underway, the Navy told TWZ. The two aircraft suffered mishaps within a half-hour of each other on Oct. 26 that President Donald Trump suggested could have been caused by “bad gas.” The exact cause of the crashes remains unclear.

“USNS Salvor (T-ARS 52), a Safeguard class salvage ship operated by Military Sealift Command, is on-scene conducting operations in support of the recovery efforts,” CMDR Matthew Comer, a 7th Fleet spokesman, said on Thursday. He provided no further details about the Salvor’s location, whether either or both aircraft have been located, or a timeline for recovery. In an email on Nov. 14, Comer told us that the “U.S. Navy has begun mobilizing units that will be used to verify the site and recover” the aircraft.

According to the MarineTraffic.com ship tracking site, the most recent position of the Salvor, dating back to Nov. 9, was just east of the Philippines island of Palawan in the South China Sea. MarineTraffic reports that the vessel left the Philippines on Nov. 8 bound for Guam, but it isn’t clear what its location is at the moment.

Given the tense and contested nature of the South China Sea and its proximity to China, there is likely a level of urgency to this operation to ensure these aircraft, or components from them, don’t fall into the hands of the Chinese. Beijing has a massive amount of assets in the region, and plenty that can handle some kind of recovery effort. The depths in the South China Sea are not that deep, either, making recovery operations easier. Like the U.S., China has foreign materiel exploitation, or FME, programs aimed at recovering weaponry for intelligence analysis and developmental purposes.

As we have written in the past about a Super Hornet recovery effort after one was blown off the deck of the supercarrier USS Harry S. Truman in 2022: “The F/A-18E is also filled with sensitive components, such as its AN/APG-79 active electronically-scanned radar, electronic warfare suite, identification friend-or-foe gear, and communications and data-sharing systems, as well as the software that runs them all. The Navy’s existing F/A-18E/F fleet has been in the process of receiving significant upgrades in recent years, too, as the service plans to continue operating these jets as core components of its carrier air wings for years to come.”

MH-60Rs are the Navy’s rotary-wing submarine hunter and are loaded with sensitive sensors, countermeasures, communications, computers and more that would be of high interest to a foreign adversary, and especially America’s chief naval competitor, China.

For all these reasons, the Navy dispatched the Salvor. It was purpose-built to conduct salvage, diving, towing, off-shore firefighting, heavy lift operations and theater security cooperation missions. According to a U.S. Navy document, it is equipped with: “a 7.5-ton capacity boom forward and a 40-ton capacity boom aft. A dynamic 150 ton lift is possible over the main bow or stern rollers using deck machinery and purchase tackle or hydraulic pullers. She can make a dynamic lift of 300 tons using the main blow rollers and stern rollers in unison.”

For diving operations, “the MK 12 and MK 1 diving systems provide Salvor divers the capability of air diving to depths of 190 feet. The divers descend to depth on a diving stage lowered by a powered davit. There is a hyperbaric chamber aboard for diver recompression following a dive or for the treatment of divers suffering from decompression sickness. For shallow underwater inspections, searches, and other tasks which require mobility, there is a full complement of SCUBA equipment on board.”

During a 2018 mission to recover aircraft shot down in 1944 near Ngerekebesang Island, Republic of Palau, the ship’s master offered some insights into its capabilities.

“The biggest advantage the Navy has with us on the Salvor is that we are standing by for them with a decompression chamber on board for divers, and we have heavy-lift capability,” Capt. Mike Flanagan, a civilian mariner and master of USNS Salvor, said at the time. “It’s just a robust ship. With our 40-ton-lift crane we can bring large and heavy objects off the bottom of the ocean.”

For perspective, Super Hornets have a maximum takeoff weight of 33 tons, according to the Navy. The Seahawks can weigh up to 11.5 tons.

Given its design, the Salvor has taken part in numerous recovery efforts, including the one after the December 2023 crash of a CV-22 Osprey off the coast of Japan last November, which killed eight crew.

As we reported at the time, the aircraft from the Nimitz crashed within a half-hour of each other on Oct. 26 as the carrier was operating somewhere in the South China Sea. The helicopter went down first at about 2:41 p.m. local time. All three crew were recovered.

Both Super Hornet crew ejected and were safely recovered when that aircraft crashed.

As we noted earlier in this story, the day after the crashes, Trump said that “bad gas” could have been to blame. Navy officials confirmed to us that they believed there was no “nefarious” cause to the crash. Last week, the Navy told us the cause is still being investigated. You can read more about the fuel issues in our initial coverage here.

The Nimitz was last spotted Nov. 18 in the San Bernardino Strait separating the Bicol Peninsula of Luzon to the north from the island of Samar to the south, according to open source investigator MT Anderson’s post on X. That’s about 420 miles east of where the Salvor was last seen. 

Last week, the Nimitz took part in a Multilateral Maritime Cooperative Activity with Japanese and Philippine vessels to demonstrate “growing regional unity and cooperation,” the Philippine military said, according to Newsweek.

That exercise sparked a warning from China.

“We solemnly urge the Philippine side to immediately stop provoking incidents and escalating tensions,” said the Southern Theater Command of the People’s Liberation Army, which oversees Chinese military operations in the South China Sea, on Sunday.

It is unknown how long it will take to recover (or demolish) these aircraft or whether the operation will even succeed. The Navy has promised to keep us apprised of its efforts. We will update this story with any significant developments.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com

Do you like your “Wicked” sweet or sour?

How you answer may be the key in how much you enjoy the sequel, “Wicked: For Good,” which opens today and is on track to sell more tickets in its first weekend than its predecessor.

Will the new movie once again cast a spell at the Oscars? The answer, for the moment, is confusifying.

I’m Glenn Whipp, columnist for the Los Angeles Times, host of The Envelope newsletter and someone hoping to see a movie at the Village before the Olympics land in L.A. in 2028. Which film should they book to kick off its revival?

‘Wicked’ can’t defy gravity this time

Cynthia Erivo, left, and Ariana Grande perform at the 97th Academy Awards in March.

(Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times)

Who wasn’t charmed by the first “Wicked” movie last year? Film critics gave it more than a pass, with reviews scoring a respectable 73 grade on aggregator site Metacritic. Audiences loved it, powering the film to a $758 million worldwide box office haul. And Oscar voters fell in line, rewarding “Wicked” with 10 nominations and wins for production design and costumes. Gratitution abounded.

Repeating success is a taller order, our beloved Dodgers notwithstanding. As noted, multiplexes should be full this first weekend and, you’d expect, the lucrative Thanksgiving weekend as well. But the reviews haven’t been as kind this time around. “Wicked: For Good” sits at a 60 on Metacritic. Empire magazine’s review sums up the sentiment: “‘Wicked: For Good,’ sure — but not quite Wicked: For Great.”

Sequels rarely land as well as the original film, so the drop-off isn’t surprising. And, if you’ve seen the Broadway musical, you already knew this was coming. All the best songs are packed into the show’s first act, culminating in the soaring, sustaining final notes of “Defying Gravity.” But you can only beat that gravitational force for so long before you fall flat on the ground.

That splat you hear is “Wicked: For Good.”

Not everyone feels that way. The Vulture review sports the grabby headline: “‘Wicked: For Good’ is actually better than the first.” Times film critic Amy Nicholson agrees in her write-up titled: “The first one was a candy-colored slog, but ‘Wicked: For Good’ is pleasantly sour.”

Which brings me back to the question I first asked you: What are you looking for in a “Wicked” movie? I enjoyed all the spirited dancing and singing and, yes, the bright, candy colors of the first movie. You want a slog? The sequel takes almost an hour to bring together the two characters you truly care about — Elphaba and Glinda.

To get to that moment, you have endure a lot of filler, as if the musical doesn’t have enough material to sustain two movies totaling nearly five hours. (It doesn’t.)

The so-so critical reaction shouldn’t keep “Wicked: For Good” from picking up a best picture nomination, provided the movie’s fans keep showing up at theaters through the end of the year. With so many high-profile festival films — “The Smashing Machine,” “After the Hunt,” “Die My Love” among them — failing to connect with audiences and critics, there’s room at the inn. Academy voters will likely keep the light on.

Equaling the first film’s 10 nominations will be difficult. Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande opened the Oscars ceremony last year in spectacular fashion, but a reunion might not be in the cards. The pair were arguably co-leads in the first movie. “For Good” belongs more to Glinda than Elphaba, charting the Good Witch’s journey from complacency and compliance to … less complacency and compliance. Maybe Glinda’s going to learn from all this and take principled stands moving forward, though the movie doesn’t do enough to convince me. Grande’s dimple has more depth.

Still, Grande figures to score another supporting actress nomination and, who knows, she may well win. Voters love big theater-kid energy in this category, giving Oscars to Jennifer Hudson (“Dreamgirls”), Anne Hathaway (“Les Misérables”), Ariana DeBose (“West Side Story”) and Zoe Saldaña (“Emilia Pérez”) in recent years.

Erivo, placed in the more competitive lead class, might not be as fortunate, as she no longer centers the movie. She still masterfully conveys Elphaba’s vulnerability and sadness, but she’s also saddled with a chemistry-free love story with Capt. Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey). I won’t count her out. But Erivo could well lead the “snubs” and surprises list come nominations morning.

Repeat nominations in production design and costume design, the two Oscars the first movie won, seem safe bets. Hair and makeup does too, as does sound since voters love movies heavy on music. “Wicked: For Good” might pick up another nomination in the newly created casting category, as it won’t be a spot where voters feel like they’re repeating themselves. And while the first movie didn’t have any new songs, “For Good” sports two. Look for “The Girl in the Bubble,” sung by Grande, to pop.

Eight nominations? That’d be a win. The loss would be if “Wicked: For Good” followed the path of the two “Black Panther” movies. The first, a critical, commercial and cultural sensation, earned seven nominations, including best picture, and won three Oscars. The less-regarded sequel picked up five nods, winning one. It was not nominated for best picture.

Sometimes being popular isn’t enough.

Read more coverage of ‘Wicked’

Tunis, Tunisia – Night had just about fallen in Halq al-Wadi, also known as La Goulette, a balmy coastal suburb of Tunis, when the Virgin Mary emerged from the local church, Saint-Augustin and Saint Fidele, into a packed square.

Carried on the shoulders of a dozen churchgoers, the statue of the Virgin was greeted with cheers, ululations and a passionately waved Tunisian flag.

Hundreds of people – Tunisians, Europeans, and sub-Saharan Africans – had gathered for the annual procession of Our Lady of Trapani.

Many of those participating in the procession, and the Catholic Mass that came beforehand, were from sub-Saharan Africa.

“It’s the Holy Virgin who has brought us all here today,” Isaac Lusafu, originally from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, told Al Jazeera. “Today the Virgin Mary has united us all”.

In a large, packed square just beyond the church gates, the statue moved in a circle as people prayed and sang hymns. It was all under the watchful eye of a mural of Claudia Cardinale, the renowned Italian actress born in La Goulette, a reminder of the distant past when the district was home to thousands of Europeans.

A melting pot

The Catholic feast of Our Lady of Trapani was brought to La Goulette in the late 1800s by Sicilian immigrants, in the days when the port town was a hub for poor southern European fishermen in search of a better life.

Immigration to Tunisia from Sicily peaked in the early 20th century. Nearly all of the fishermen, along with their families and descendants, have now returned to European shores, but the statue of the Virgin remained – and, every year on August 15, it is carried in procession out of the church.

“It’s a unique event,” Hatem Bourial, a Tunisian journalist and radio presenter, told Al Jazeera.

He went on to describe how, in the procession’s heyday in the early 20th century, native Tunisians, Muslims and Jews alike, would join Tunisian-Sicilian Catholics in carrying the statue of the Virgin Mary from the church down to the sea.

There, participants would ask Mary to bless the fishermen’s boats. Many residents would shout “Long live the Virgin of Trapani!”, Bourial said, while others threw their chechia, a traditional red cap worn in the Maghreb, in the air.

As well as its religious significance – for Catholics, August 15 marks the day that Mary was taken up into heaven – the feast also coincides with the Italian mid-August holiday of Ferragosto, which traditionally signals the high point of the summer.

Silvia Finzi, born in Tunis in the 1950s to Italian parents, described how, after the statue had been brought down to the sea, many of La Goulette’s residents would declare that the worst of the punishingly hot Tunisian summer was over.

“Once the Virgin had been taken down to the water, it was as if the sea had changed”, Finzi, a professor of Italian at the University of Tunis, told Al Jazeera.

“People would say ‘the sea has changed, the summer’s over’, and you wouldn’t need to go swimming to cool down any more”.

European exodus

The first European immigrants began to arrive in La Goulette in the early 19th century. Their numbers rapidly increased after 1881, when Tunisia became a French protectorate. At its height in the early 1900s, the number of Italian immigrants – who were largely Sicilians – across the whole of Tunisia is estimated to have been more than 100,000.

In the decade after 1956, when Tunisia gained its independence from France, the vast majority of its European residents left the country, as the new government pivoted towards nationalism.

In 1964, the Vatican signed an agreement with Tunisia, transferring control of the majority of the country’s churches – now largely empty – to the government for use as public buildings. The agreement also put an end to all public Christian celebrations, including the procession in La Goulette.

For more than half a century, August 15 was marked only with a Mass inside the church building, and the statue of Our Lady of Trapani remained immobile in its niche. The date remained important for La Goulette’s much-reduced Catholic population, but it largely ceased to be an important event for the wider community.

Nostalgia

In 2017, the Catholic Church received permission to restart the procession, initially just inside the church compound. This year, when Al Jazeera visited, the procession left the church property but only travelled as far as the square outside.

Many attendees were young Tunisian Muslims, with little connection to La Goulette’s historic Sicilian population.

A major reason for this is undoubtedly the high status accorded to the Virgin Mary in Islam – an entire chapter of the Quran is dedicated to her.

Other participants seemed to be drawn by a feeling of nostalgia for La Goulette’s multiethnic, multireligious past.

“I love the procession”, Rania, 26, told Al Jazeera. “Lots of people have forgotten about it now, but European immigration is such an important part of Tunisia’s history”.

Rania, a student, told Al Jazeera of her love for the 1996 film, Un ete a La Goulette (A Summer in La Goulette).

Featuring dialogue in three languages, and evocative shots of sunlit courtyards and shimmering beaches, the film is an ode to La Goulette’s past.

Directed by the renowned Tunisian filmmaker Ferid Boughedir, it follows the lives of three teenage girls – Gigi, a Sicilian, Meriem, a Muslim, and Tina, a Jew – over the course of a summer in the 1960s.

The film ends, however, on a bleak note, with the outbreak of the 1967 War between Israel and several Arab states, and the subsequent departure of almost all of Tunisia’s remaining Jewish and European residents.

New migrations

As Tunisia’s European population declined, the country has seen an influx of new migrant communities from sub-Saharan Africa.

The majority of these new migrants, who number in the tens of thousands, hail from Francophone West Africa. Many come to Tunisia in search of work; others hope to find passage across the Mediterranean to Europe.

Many of the sub-Saharan migrants – who face widespread discrimination in Tunisia – are Christian, and as a result, they now make up the vast majority of Tunisia’s churchgoing population.

This fact is reflected in a mural in the church in La Goulette, inspired by the feast of Our Lady of Trapani. Painted in 2017, it depicts the Virgin Mary sheltering a group of people – Tunisians, Sicilians and sub-Saharan Africans – under her mantle.

The air around the Virgin in the mural is full of passports. The church’s priest, Father Narcisse, who hails from Chad, told Al Jazeera that these represent the documents that immigrants throw into the sea while making the journey from North Africa to Europe in the hope of evading deportation.

The mural highlights the fact that the Madonna of Trapani, once considered the protector of Sicilian fishermen, is today called upon by immigrants of far more varied backgrounds.

“This celebration, in its original form, marked the deep bonds between the two shores of the Mediterranean,” Archbishop of Tunis Nicolas Lhernould told Al Jazeera. “Today, it brings together a more diverse group – Tunisians, Africans, Europeans; locals, migrants, and tourists.”

“Mary herself was a migrant,” Archbishop Lhernould said, referring to the New Testament story which narrates Mary’s flight, together with the child Jesus and her husband Joseph, from Palestine to Egypt.

From a Christian perspective, he suggested, “we are all migrants, just passing through, citizens of a kingdom which is not of this world”.

The spirit of La Goulette

La Goulette was once home to ‘Little Sicily’, an area characterised by its clusters of Italian-style apartment buildings. The vast majority of these structures – modest buildings built by the newly-arrived fishermen – have been torn down and replaced, and little more than the church remains to testify to the area’s once significant Sicilian presence.

As of 2019, there were only 800 Italians descended from the original immigrant community left in the whole of Tunisia.

“There are so few of us left”, said Rita Strazzera, who was born in Tunis to Sicilian parents. The Tunisian-Sicilian community meets very rarely, she explained, with some members coming together for the celebration on the 15th August, and holding occasional meetings in a small bookshop opposite the church.

Still, the spirit of Little Sicily has not entirely vanished. Traces of the old La Goulette linger – in memory, in film, and, Strazzera told Al Jazeera, in other, more surprising ways as well.

“Every year, on All Saints’ Day, I go to the graveyard”, said Strazzera, referring to the annual celebration when Catholics remember their deceased loved ones.

“And there are Tunisians there, Muslims, people who maybe had a Sicilian parent, or a Sicilian grandparent, and have come to visit their graves, because they know it’s what Catholics do.”

“There have been lots of mixed marriages”, Strazzera added, “and so, every year, there are more of them visiting the graves. When I see them, it’s like a reminder that Little Sicily is still with us.”

The impact of Machine Learning (ML) on the global Foreign Exchange (Forex) is growing day by day. This results in a profound transformation of the algorithmic landscape, leading to a decrease in the dominance of human intuition, quantitative models, and macroeconomic analysis. These changes impact the growth of market efficiency, shift risk management patterns, and affect the very nature of global currency flow.

The ML-Driven Revolution in Forex Trading

Machine Learning, as an essential subset of Artificial Intelligence (AI), helps computer systems learn from extended datasets, identify sophisticated models, and make predictions without any pre-programmed patterns. Human traders simply cannot match the edge ML provides because the very environment of the currency market is getting faster and more data-rich.

Enhancing Predictive Analysis

ML models process vast volumes of market data pretty successfully. Their performance ranges from simple tick-by-tick price movements and trading volumes to social media responses and global news feeds. That is why forecasting with unprecedented accuracy becomes a reality. All this deals with the following:

1. Real-time data synthesis. The algorithms analyze time-series data, learn from historical market volatility, and immediately adapt to new information. Recurrent Neural Networks (RNNs) and Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) are especially efficient for that.
2. Sentiment analysis. ML systems use Natural Language Processing (NLP). That allows them to scan thousands of new articles, economic reports, and political statements. Therefore, they never miss leading indicators based on market sentiment towards a specific currency.
3. Pattern recognition. ML can detect and observe subtle, non-linear relationships between disparate currency pairs and timeframes. In that way, they analyze all possible opportunities. 

Automation and Execution Speed

The most obvious impact of ML is observed in spreading algorithmic trading. Trades executed by automated systems are based on ML-driven insights. So, they are speedy, precise, and independent of human emotional bias.

Such automation is clearly observed in Expert Advisors (EAs), or trading bots. They can operate autonomously on various platforms, for example, on MetaTrader. The industry needs and is continuously introducing new top-rated Forex EAs. Their algorithms have already demonstrated perfect performance and resilience. These ML-powered EAs can manage such strategies as:

• High-Frequency Trading (HFT), processing thousands of trades per second;
• Adaptable trend following, used for adjusting stop-loss and take-profit levels to the shifts in real-time market schedules;
• Risk mitigation strategies, implemented through changes in hedging positions and reducing leverage according to predicted spikes in volatility.

Strategic Implications for Global Finance

ML integration into the Forex environment has far-reaching consequences. It affects international capital flows and requires enhanced risk management for financial institutions and states.

Redefining Currency Risk Management

ML provides high-quality tools for hedging and managing currency exposure. It is vital for multinational corporations and central banks. The significantly improved forecasting accuracy is crucial for optimizing forward contract planning and international payment strategies.

ML models can ensure dynamic hedging by continuous reassessment of risk-return profiles. They are capable of recommending dynamic adjustments to hedging ratios due to changing geopolitical or economic situations.

Moreover, advanced AI models can detect unusual trading patterns. That can diminish market abuse, like front-running or spoofing, much faster than conventional surveillance systems can. So, market integrity becomes better managed and more sustainable.

Geopolitical and Regulatory Challenges

So, we have examined the obvious benefits of the strategic deployment of ML. However, what about drawbacks? There are certain challenges here that require regulatory foresight and diplomatic engagement. They involve the following:

1. Algorithmic bias. An ML model may be trained on biased or incomplete historical data. That can cause systemic flaws and market instabilities, especially during unforeseen global events.
2. Concentration of power. Large hedge funds and financial institutions can concentrate large power in their hands. That may happen because the resources needed to develop, deploy, and maintain advanced ML infrastructure are hardly available beyond their authority. The need for specialized hardware and proprietary datasets may result in a systemic risk to market decentralization.
3. Need for explainability. All regulators require transparency. Complex neural networks cannot provide that due to their ‘black box’ nature. It creates a compliance hurdle that must be overcome with the help of explainable AI (XAI) frameworks.

Conclusion: A New Era of Algorithmic Diplomacy

We need to understand and accept that Machine Learning is not an additional helping tool but a superior new operating system for global currency exchange. It strategically impacts everything related to international trading. Its ability to extract the most actionable intelligence from gigantic data volumes can result in hyper-efficient, instantaneous, and emotionless trade operations.

The rise of complex algorithmic systems, including top-rated Forex EAs, requires a new form of ‘algorithmic diplomacy.’ That is why global financial institutions and regulators must keep in touch, and their collaboration should be aimed at ethical frameworks and technical standards development. That can help them enhance the stability, transparency, and fairness of the international trading market for the benefit of the entire global economy.

Emmerdale’s Bradley Riches – who stars as Lewis Barton in the ITV soap – revealed that acting classes had on big impact on him

Emmerdale star Bradley Riches revealed that acting “saved” him as he opened up about being on the autistic spectrum.

The actor – who plays Lewis Barton in the ITV soap – was diagnosed at nine and did not use words to communicate until he was 10.

However, during an appearance on ITV’s Loose Women on Friday (November 21) he told how drama classes had helped him.

Discussing his experience, the Heartstopper star told the panel: “So, with me, for example, especially with my childhood, I didn’t use words for formal communication until I was 10.”

Asked how he communicated, Bradley explained: “Through, like, sound, movement, communication cards. For example, if my shoes weren’t feeling right, I would have a card and slap it to communicate with my parents.”

Asked if drama classes had helped, he said: “Yeah, I feel like acting definitely saved me in a lot of ways. It’s like, obviously, growing up, not speaking, and then my nan being like, ‘Oh, let’s just throw him into a drama class for confidence.’

“I was like, OK, that’s bonkers. But I went in there and then I would start listening to you know, like you’re watching TV, like these American accents, and slowly over time, I was putting these accents on, and through characters, I kind of learn via myself.

“So through a character, I’ve kind of embedded, OK, how would Bradley say this? How would I do this?

“Through acting, it was kind of an escapism, and it was kind of changing.”

Bradley, 23, joined ITV’s Emmerdale this year as Lewis Barton and revealed that he jumped at the opportunity.

He told the panel: “When I found out Lewis was an autistic character, it was, everything I do, every job I take, I’ve always wanted to kind of fly the flag for the community I’m a part of, like, be it the queer community or the autistic community.

“So, when I found out, you know, Lewis was a double, gay and autistic, I was like, get in there!”

“I mean, I have always wanted to tell stories, autistic stories, especially positive ones,” the actor added.

Loose Women airs at 12.30pm on ITV on weekdays and Emmerdale airs weeknights on ITV1 at 7.30pm and available to stream from 7am on ITVX

Nov. 21 (UPI) — The United States has sanctioned dozens of individuals, entities, vessels and aircraft accused of participating in Iran’s oil-shipping networks, as the Trump administration continues to squeeze the Islamic nation with its reinstated maximum pressure campaign.

The State Department said Thursday it was adding 17 names of companies people and vessels to its sanctions list, while the Treasury said it was adding 41.

“The United States remains committed to disrupting the illicit funding streams that finance all aspects of Iran’s malign activities,” State Department spokesman Thomas Pigott said in a statement.

“As long as Iran devotes revenue to funding attacks against the United States and our allies, supporting terrorism around the world and pursuing other destabilizing actions, we will use all the tools at our disposal to hold the regime accountable.”

In February, President Donald Trump reinstated his maximum pressure campaign of sanctions and other punitive economic measures against Iran from his first administration to force Iran to return to the negotiating table on a new deal aimed at preventing Tehran from securing a nuclear weapon.

Since reinstating the policy, Trump has repeatedly imposed sanctions targeting Iran, specifically its illicit oil trade, which funds its military forces.

The Treasury said it was sanctioning an additional six vessels of Tehran’s shadow fleet of oil tankers that export energy products. It also blacklisted Mahan Air, which works closely with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force, the Iranian military’s specialized elite unit that oversees international operations and funds proxy militias, such as Hamas and Hezbollah.

The State Department said its sanctioned targets were located in several countries, including India, panama and the Seychelles, among others.

The sanctions freeze all property of the named companies and individuals in the United States and bar U.S. persons from doing business with them.

“Today’s action continues Treasury’s campaign to cut off funding for the Iranian regime’s development of nuclear weapons and support of terrorist proxies,” Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in a statement.

“Disrupting the Iranian regime’s revenue is critical to helping curb its nuclear ambitions.”

EXPLAINER

At least five people killed in deadly earthquake close to the capital city Dhaka on Friday.

A powerful earthquake shook Bangladesh close to the capital city, Dhaka, on Friday, killing at least five people and injuring many others, the government said.

Here is what we know so far.

What happened?

An earthquake of magnitude 5.5 hit Bangladesh at 10:38am (04:38 GMT), the US Geological Survey (USGS) said. The shaking lasted for 26 seconds.

Dhaka resident Shadman Sakif Islam told Al Jazeera that “small ripples” he noticed in his coffee were followed by a “massive shake that started occurring without any warning” as the earthquake took hold.

“My chair and the table started shaking wildly, and I was stuck there 10-15 seconds without processing what was going on,” he added.

“I never felt anything like this in my whole life … I felt like riding on a boat, riding massive waves one after another,” he added.

Where in Bangladesh did the earthquake hit?

The tremor was felt near the city of Narsingdi, which is 33km (16 miles) from Dhaka. Many buildings in Dhaka sustained damage from the resulting quake.

The epicentre was in Narsingdi’s Madhabdi district, according to the Bangladesh Meteorological Department.

The tremors were felt as far away as in the neighbouring Indian city of Kolkata, more than 325km (about 200 miles)  from the epicentre. No casualties have been reported there.

Narsingdi is famous for its textile craft and garment industry.

What do we know about the casualties?

According to government figures, at least five people have been killed and roughly 100 people have been injured.

Local media has reported higher death toll figures, but these have not been confirmed.

On Friday, Dhaka-based DBC Television reported that at least six people had died in the capital – three when a building roof and wall collapsed and three pedestrians who were struck by falling railings.

Are earthquakes common in Bangladesh?

Earthquakes do not take place in Bangladesh very frequently, despite the country being close to the boundaries of the Indian, Eurasian and Burmese tectonic plates and thus, seismically vulnerable.

In 2023, an earthquake of magnitude 5.8 struck near Sylhet in northeastern Bangladesh, according to the German Research Center for Geosciences (GFZ). There were no reports of casualties or major damage from the quake.

In 2021, a magnitude-6.1 earthquake hit the border between India and Myanmar. Tremors were felt in Bangladesh’s Chittagong and Cox’s Bazar. There were no confirmed deaths in Bangladesh.

Magnitudes are based on a logarithmic scale, meaning for each whole-number increase on the scale, the magnitude is increased by a factor of 10.

Al Jazeera’s Tanvir Chowdhury, reporting from Dhaka, said, “It was one of the biggest earthquakes in recent history and was very close to the capital city. The entire city was in panic. Social media videos have shown buildings shaking.”

ADAM Peaty’s troubled brother James has made a bizarre move as he joins social media amid a family feud.

Adam, 30, recently took to social media and accused his family of “encouraging” false claims about him and his fiancée Holly Ramsay, 25.

Now, his brother James has joined Instagram and posed topless for his profile picture with Adam’s photo in the background.

Adam has uninvited his whole family, bar his sister, from the couple’s imminent winter wedding over their family rift.

Guests at the event in Bath are expected to include Holly’s chef dad Gordon, as well as David and Victoria Beckham.

Adam’s aunt Louise branded his fiancé Holly “divisive and hurtful” after his mother Caroline wasn’t invited to her hen do at Soho Farmhouse.

SPEAKING OUT

Adam Peaty & Holly Ramsay break silence on ‘hurtful’ feud & slam his family

WEDDING RIFT

Adam Peaty’s family feud escalates as he BANS mum from wedding to Holly Ramsay

Holly later called the police while her husband-to-be was on his stag do in Budapest over concerns he could be assaulted by his brother when he got back to the UK.

Five officers met 30-year-old Adam’s plane when it arrived at Manchester Airport and escorted him through passport control.

It has since emerged that James, 34, was arrested at his Staffordshire home and later bailed.

A source close to Adam and Holly said: “This feud is heart-breaking from both sides.

“But the reality is that Adam sees his mum Caroline to be enabling his brother’s actions rather than pushing him to deal with his demons.

“Poor Caroline must feel utterly torn and it’s just very hard for everyone.

“Gordon has been incredibly supportive of Holly and Adam; after all, he’s been through similar issues with his own brother.”

Adam’s father Mark previously told The Sun: “They’re brothers.

“They’ve always been close but like any normal family, brothers fight, argue, fall out, make-up and start all over again. But it’s got out of hand.

“There’s been very little empathy towards Jamie’s genuine mental health difficulties.”

However, Adam recently assured fans there were two sides to the story and insisted he only has good intentions.

It follows claims that he has changed since meeting Holly and becoming part of the Ramsay clan, distancing himself from his working class roots.

He continued: “Bethany, Holly and myself cannot go into detail given an ongoing police investigation into serious matters that arose long before recent events.

“For those who know me personally, you know that I work so hard on trying to improve myself as a person who wants to contribute to making the world a better place.

“I am continuing to learn about myself and how I can be the man I want to be; a worthy partner, father, businessman, friend and athlete; even through these challenging times.

kell no

Jack Osbourne’s furious sister rips into ‘bully’ Kelly Brook after I’m A Celeb row

MUM PAIN

I was arrested in front of daughter for WhatsApp message, £20k won’t erase trauma

“Bethany, Holly and I will get through this – we do not ask for sympathy. We just need people to be aware that there are always two sides to every story.

“To those of you who have reached out and shown kindness and understanding – thank you. It is deeply appreciated.”

Jubata al-Khashab, Quneitra, Syria – When Syrians gather to record Israeli incursions, soldiers point their guns at them.

Israeli military incursions have become more brazen, more frequent and more violent since Israel expanded its occupation of southern Syria following the ousting of President Bashar al-Assad in December 2024.

Across Quneitra province, the Israeli military’s tanks have established checkpoints and patrols, even setting up gates. They stop and search civilians, and some are abducted.

Khadija Arnous’s husband and brother-in-law are among those taken from their home in July. Her brother-in-law was released from Sednaya prison, and now he is in Israeli custody.

At 3am (00:00 GMT) one day, Israeli soldiers ordered both men to leave the house and blindfolded them.

“We’ve had no news about them since,” Arnous told Al Jazeera, covering her face for fear of reprisal. “We contacted the Red Cross, but to no avail.”

“I have four children – my husband was the sole provider. I urge the government to find a solution for us. Why are the Israelis coming and taking whoever they want?”

Described by Israel as security operations, Syrian authorities and human rights groups refer to such incidents as abductions or unlawful arrests. As many as 40 people have reportedly been detained in recent weeks.

Israel first seized territory in the Golan Heights following the 1967 war. But after the fall of al-Assad, it claimed its 1974 disengagement agreement with Syria was void and has widened its occupation in Syria by some 400sq km (155sq miles).

Mohammad Mazen Mriwed, an elder from Jubata al-Khashab village, told Al Jazeera that people are living in fear of Israeli incursions and can no longer work their land.

“Since the fall of the regime, many are no longer building or cultivating,” he said. “We don’t know how the government will respond, but true relief will come only when the occupation ends.”

In addition to taking Syrians, Israeli forces are also fortifying their positions with large berms and watchtowers. Sanad, Al Jazeera’s fact-checking agency, has verified the establishment of nine new Israeli military camps in Syria since December 2024.

Local elders estimate 1,700 acres (688 hectares) of land seized by Israeli forces includes orchards, fields and grazing lands.

Israeli forces have flattened entire areas, uprooting trees believed to be hundreds of years old, to build more military presence on Syrian soil, villagers and shepherds say.

Mohammad Makkiyah went too close to a watchtower and was shot by an Israeli sniper. He says the first shot missed his head, but as he ran from a volley of fire, a bullet hit his leg.

In a nearby house, Hussain Bakr’s son and brother were taken five months ago.

“We complained to the UN and the Red Cross, who told us that they will ask the Israelis, but there is no response,” Bakr told Al Jazeera. “They are innocent, taken for no reason.”

Residents say interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa should remember his own family’s displacement when Israel occupied the Golan Heights. The president has previously said his grandfather was forced to flee the area in 1967.

Government representatives say they are trying for solutions through diplomacy.

But until the missing come home, words offer little solace.

“The situation is painful for the families and for us as a government,” Jamal Numairi, a People’s Assembly member from Quneitra, told Al Jazeera. “To the families, I say: the government will spare no effort to resolve the issue. I consider them kidnapped, not as prisoners.”

The United States has revealed all 28 points of its proposal to end the Russia-Ukraine war to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. The plan, which has been heavily criticised as far too favourable to Russia by many observers, is in its draft stage and has yet to be made public. However, a Ukrainian official is understood to have provided the details to international media.

Here is a closer look at the points and the significance of this plan.

What are the 28 points of Trump’s proposal for Ukraine?

1. Ukraine’s sovereignty will be confirmed.

2. A comprehensive, non-aggression agreement will be concluded between Russia, Ukraine and Europe. All ambiguities of the last 30 years will be considered settled.

3. It is expected that Russia will not invade neighbouring countries and NATO will not expand further.

4. A dialogue will be held between Russia and NATO, mediated by the US, to resolve all security issues and create conditions for de-escalation to ensure global security and increase opportunities for cooperation and future economic development.

5. Ukraine will receive reliable security guarantees.

6. The size of the Armed Forces of Ukraine will be limited to 600,000 personnel.

7. Ukraine agrees to enshrine in its constitution that it will not join NATO, and NATO agrees to include in its statutes a provision that Ukraine will not be admitted in the future.

8. NATO agrees not to station troops in Ukraine.

9. European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland.

10. The US security guarantee will have the following caveats:

• The US will receive compensation for the guarantee;
• If Ukraine invades Russia, it will lose the guarantee;
• If Russia invades Ukraine, in addition to a decisive coordinated military response, all global sanctions will be reinstated, recognition of the new territory and all other benefits of this deal will be revoked;
• If Ukraine launches a missile at Moscow or Saint Petersburg without cause, the security guarantee will be deemed invalid.

11. Ukraine is eligible for European Union (EU) membership and will receive short-term preferential access to the EU market while this issue is being considered.

12. A powerful global package of measures will be provided to rebuild Ukraine, including but not limited to:

• The creation of a Ukraine Development Fund to invest in fast-growing industries, including technology, data centres and artificial intelligence.
• The US will cooperate with Ukraine to jointly rebuild, develop, modernise and operate Ukraine’s gas infrastructure, including pipelines and storage facilities.
• Joint efforts to rehabilitate war-affected areas for the restoration, reconstruction and modernisation of cities and residential areas.
• Infrastructure development.
• Extraction of minerals and natural resources.
• The World Bank will develop a special financing package to accelerate these efforts.

13. Russia will be reintegrated into the global economy:

• The lifting of sanctions will be discussed and agreed upon in stages and on a case-by-case basis.
• The US will enter into a long-term economic cooperation agreement for mutual development in the areas of energy, natural resources, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, data centres, rare earth metal extraction projects in the Arctic, and other mutually beneficial corporate opportunities.
• Russia will be invited to rejoin the G8.

14. Frozen funds will be used as follows:

• $100bn in frozen Russian assets will be invested in US-led efforts to rebuild and invest in Ukraine;
• The US will receive 50 percent of the profits from this venture. Europe will add $100bn to increase the amount of investment available for Ukraine’s reconstruction. Frozen European funds will be unfrozen. The remainder of the frozen Russian funds will be invested in a separate US-Russian investment vehicle that will implement joint projects in specific areas. This fund will be aimed at strengthening relations and increasing common interests to create a strong incentive not to return to conflict.

15. A joint American-Russian working group on security issues will be established to promote and ensure compliance with all provisions of this agreement.

16. Russia will enshrine in law its policy of non-aggression towards Europe and Ukraine.

17. The US and Russia will agree to extend the validity of treaties on the non-proliferation and control of nuclear weapons, including the START I Treaty.

18. Ukraine agrees to be a non-nuclear state in accordance with the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).

19. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant will be launched under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), and the electricity produced will be distributed equally between Russia and Ukraine, 50:50.

20. Both countries undertake to implement educational programmes in schools and society aimed at promoting understanding and tolerance of different cultures and eliminating racism and prejudice:

• Ukraine will adopt EU rules on religious tolerance and the protection of linguistic minorities.
• Both countries will agree to abolish all discriminatory measures and guarantee the rights of Ukrainian and Russian media and education.
• All Nazi ideology and activities must be rejected and prohibited.

21. Territories:

• Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk will be recognised as de facto Russian, including by the US.
• Kherson and Zaporizhia will be frozen along the line of contact, which will mean de facto recognition along the line of contact.
• Russia will relinquish other agreed territories it controls outside the five regions.
• Ukrainian forces will withdraw from the part of Donetsk oblast that they currently control, and this withdrawal zone will be considered a neutral demilitarised buffer zone, internationally recognised as territory belonging to the Russian Federation. Russian forces will not enter this demilitarised zone.

22. After agreeing on future territorial arrangements, both the Russian Federation and Ukraine undertake not to change these arrangements by force. Any security guarantees will not apply in the event of a breach of this commitment.

23. Russia will not prevent Ukraine from using the Dnipro River for commercial activities, and agreements will be reached on the free transport of grain across the Black Sea.

24. A humanitarian committee will be established to resolve outstanding issues:

• All remaining prisoners and bodies will be exchanged on an “all for all” basis.
• All civilian detainees and hostages will be returned, including children.
• A family reunification programme will be implemented.
• Measures will be taken to alleviate the suffering of the victims of the conflict.

25. Ukraine will hold elections in 100 days.

26. All parties involved in this conflict will receive full amnesty for their actions during the war and agree not to make any claims or consider any complaints in the future.

27. This agreement will be legally binding. Its implementation will be monitored and guaranteed by the Peace Council, headed by President Donald J Trump. Sanctions will be imposed for violations.

28. Once all parties agree to this memorandum, the ceasefire will take effect immediately after both sides retreat to the agreed points to begin implementation of the agreement.

How has Ukraine reacted to these proposals?

Zelenskyy met with US Army officials in Kyiv on Thursday to discuss the proposals, which have been drawn up by US and Russian officials without any input from Ukraine or its European allies.

After the meeting, Zelenskyy said in an address: “The American side presented points of a plan to end the war – their vision. I outlined our key principles. We agreed that our teams will work on the points to ensure it’s all genuine.”

Zelenskyy added, “From the first days of the war, we have upheld one very simple position: Ukraine needs peace. A real peace – one that will not be broken by a third invasion. A dignified peace – with terms that respect our independence, our sovereignty and the dignity of the Ukrainian people.”

The Ukrainian president said that he will now discuss the proposals with Ukraine’s European allies.

Does this mean Ukraine and its allies will accept the proposal?

No.

“Zelenskyy had a nuanced response – he said ‘We will work on it’,” Keir Giles, a Eurasia expert at the London political think tank Chatham House, told Al Jazeera.

However, he added that agreeing to the terms of the plan in its current form would be “catastrophic” for Ukraine because of the heavy concessions Kyiv is being asked to make.

While European leaders have not reacted to the 28-point plan, they have indicated that they would not accept a plan that requires Ukraine to make such concessions.

“Ukrainians want peace – a just peace that respects everyone’s sovereignty, a durable peace that can’t be called into question by future aggression,” said French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot. “But peace cannot be a capitulation.”

For now, Ukraine’s allies are not commenting. European Council President Antonio Costa said that the EU has not yet been officially informed about the US plan, so “it makes no sense to comment” on it.

More reactions from Europe might come starting from Saturday, when Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will speak at the G20 summit.

“A 28-point plan was made public. We will discuss the situation both with European leaders and with leaders here on the sidelines of the G20,” von der Leyen said, according to UK media.

What are Russia and the US saying about this plan now?

The US has not made details of the plan public, and officials from Washington have not commented on it.

Russia has denied that there have been formal consultations between the US and Russia on a peace plan.

“Consultations are not currently under way. There are contacts, of course, but there is no process that could be called consultations,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.

Meanwhile, Hungarian PM and close Trump ally Viktor Orban seemed to back the plan on Friday.

In an X post, Orban wrote that Trump’s plan had “gained new momentum”.

“The American President is a persistent maverick. If he had been President at the time, the war would never have broken out. It is clear that once he sets his mind on something, he does not let it go, and he has certainly set his mind on ending the Russian-Ukrainian war,” Orban wrote.

President @realDonaldTrump‘s peace initiative has gained new momentum. A 28-point peace plan is on the table, an American negotiating delegation is in Kyiv, and expectations are high worldwide. The American President is a persistent maverick. If he had been President at the time,… pic.twitter.com/J2cagATvc5

— Orbán Viktor (@PM_ViktorOrban) November 21, 2025

What do analysts say about these proposals?

Experts said the terms of the 28-point plan and how they would be implemented are far from clear.

“The terms are unenforceable, nonsensical and vague that they cannot be enforced without months of wrangling,” Giles said.

For instance, he said, point 9 states that European fighter jets will be stationed in Poland. However, it is unclear what “European” or “fighter jets” mean.

Giles said “European” could mean the European Union or European countries. “‘Fighter jets’ is a militarily meaningless term, which provides plenty of room for argument,” he added.

How would the US be ‘compensated’ for security guarantees?

It is unclear what security guarantees the US is offering Ukraine. Further details of these have not been released.

Point 10 states that the “US will receive compensation for the guarantee”. While it is unclear what the specific compensation would be, experts suggest that point 14 may shed some light on this.

Point 14 of the plan states that $100bn in frozen Russian assets plus $100bn from Europe would be used for Ukraine’s reconstruction.

The plan further states that the US will receive 50 percent of the profits from the reconstruction of Ukraine. It is not specified how these profits would be generated.

The plan also states that remaining Russian funds would go into a joint US-Russia investment vehicle for projects to build ties and deter future conflict, again with little detail.

Giles said this likely refers to about $300bn in Russian Central Bank assets, which have been frozen by the US and European countries since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

In October this year, EU leaders suggested a “reparations plan” under which it would use frozen Russian assets to lend Ukraine $164bn to buy European weapons, and for reconstruction.

Giles said that the point about Russian frozen assets was likely deliberately added by negotiators from Moscow because “Russia has already written off frozen assets abroad, and now is dangling that as a carrot in front of the US”.

Giles added that, according to earlier plans, however, “those funds were supposed to rebuild Ukraine”.

However, now we don’t know whether the reconstruction will be of a “free Ukraine or Russian efforts of Russification in occupied Ukraine”, he said.

Would the proposal give Russia amnesty for war crimes?

Point 26 of the plan states that all parties involved in the conflict will receive “full amnesty for their actions during the war”.

In March 2023, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin over the illegal deportation of children from Ukraine to Russia.

The US cannot unilaterally grant amnesty to an individual convicted of war crimes by an international organisation.

“Writing off the war, pretending it never happened, rolling back sanctions and ignoring war crimes is just one of the elements of this draft list where the US is assuming the cooperation of the rest of the world,” Giles said.

He added that a large number of countries across the world strongly believe in international law, and are likely to push back on this point.

“If a negotiation like this were to be enforced, then it is the US endorsing the seizure of territory through open arms aggression, and it will be encouragement to other aggressors around the world that they have the US blessing,” Giles warned.

What territory would Ukraine have to concede?

The plan says that Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk would be considered Russian territory.

Donetsk and Luhansk are collectively called the Donbas region.

Crimea was seized by Russia from Ukraine in 2014 and remains a matter of dispute.

According to the Institute for the Study of War, overall, Ukraine still controls 14.5 percent of the territory in the Donbas, including parts of Donetsk around the cities of Sloviansk and Kramatorsk.

Russia also controls 75 percent of Zaporizhia and Kherson in southern Ukraine, bordering the Black Sea. The plan says that the current battle lines will be frozen in these regions.

How would Russia be brought back into the international fold?

Parts of the proposal aim to bring Russia out of the isolation imposed on it by the Western world since it started the Ukraine war.

Point 12 states that Russia will be invited to rejoin the G8.

The G8 – currently the G7 – was an unofficial forum for the leaders of eight major industrialised nations: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the US.

Russia was part of the G8 but was ejected following the annexation of Crimea in 2014.

The plan also mentions the establishment of a US-Russian investment vehicle that would implement joint projects in specific areas. However, further details about this have not been revealed.

The plan also mentions the formation of a joint US-Russian working group on security issues to ensure compliance with the plan.

Will the proposal end the war in Ukraine?

Analysts are doubtful. “This agreement is not going anywhere – similar to the previous ones,” Giles said.

He called it “another iteration of the merry-go-round that we’ve been on many times before”.

He said he believes the plan will receive pushback from Ukraine and Europe, which will want to negotiate changes.

The final film of the late Glenda Jackson and, if he remains true to his word, of Michael Caine, “The Great Escaper” has made its way to America two years after its U.K. release. Premiering Sunday under the umbrella of the PBS series “Masterpiece Theatre,” the film tells the true-life story of Bernie Jordan, who, at 89, set off unaccompanied and unannounced from an English retirement home to attend celebrations marking the 70th anniversary of D-Day in Normandy, France. (This event also inspired a Pierce Brosnan film, “The Last Rifleman,” which came out about the same time.) Love and time and duty are its themes. Written by William Ivory and directed by Oliver Parker, it’s a simple story, simply told — sweet, but not saccharine, and moving even when you know what’s coming.

Bernie (Caine) lives with his wife, Rene (Jackson), in a care home by the sea in the town of Hove. She needs more medical attention than he, but both have their wits about them. Having missed securing a spot among the groups traveling to Normandy, Bernie, a Royal Navy veteran, with Rene’s encouragement, decides to go it alone. Though he uses a walker and can seem tired or abstracted at times — he has much on his mind, and a specific mission to fulfill — the trip itself is not especially hard on him. It becomes all the easier once he meets, on the ferry across the English Channel, Arthur Howard-Johnson (John Standing, very fine), an RAF veteran who offers him a place with his group and a bed in his hotel room. As the film goes on, he becomes more and more focused, growing alert and lively and taking charge of Arthur, who had earlier taken charge of him. Each, it will transpire, carries a burden of guilt dating from the invasion.

Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson in “The Great Escaper.”

(Rob Youngson / Masterpiece, Pathé, BBC Films)

Back in Hove, the staff, represented by aide Adele (Danielle Vitalis) and manager Judith (Jackie Clune), is not immediately aware of Bernie’s absence — he’s allowed to come and go — and Rene, who has a tendency to fence with them anyway, is keeping quiet in order to give him time to get away. When they learn he’s missing, a search begins; eventually, Rene lets the truth slip, the exploit hits the press and Bernie, unaware of any of this, is given the nickname “The Great Escaper.” He’ll return home an annoyed celebrity.

Flashbacks, with Will Fletcher as young Bernie and Laura Marcus as young Rene, recall the couple’s wartime meeting and Bernie’s interactions with a young soldier on D-Day. Integrated as memories, they enrich the present action without overexplaining it.

Jackson and Caine, you may know or should learn, were icons of British thespian glamour in the 1960s and ’70s, she in “Marat/Sade,” “Women in Love” and “Elizabeth R,” he in “Alfie” and the Harry Palmer films (“The Ipcress File,” et al.); in 1975, they starred together in Joseph Losey’s “The Romantic Englishwoman,” co-written by Tom Stoppard. Always politically active, Jackson took off 23 years from acting, from 1992 to 2015, to serve as a member of Parliament, and returned to play “King Lear” in London and on Broadway and win a Tony for a revival of Edward Albee’s “Three Tall Women.” Caine, notwithstanding some slow times, made movies all along, all sorts of them, playing Scrooge in “The Muppet Christmas Carol,” Mike Myers’ father in “Austin Powers in Goldmember” and Alfred in the Christopher Nolan’s “Batman” trilogy and parts in five other Nolan films. Watching “The Great Escaper,” you’re seeing history.

Neither has lost a step. (I find it pleasant to remember that, however frail or confused an older character may be, the person playing them is doing a job that requires strength and thought.) Given both the eminence of the actors and their age — Caine was 90 when “The Great Escaper” premiered, while Jackson, 87, died shortly before — it’s hard not to watch with a double consciousness of the players and the parts. But rather than a distraction, it redoubles the impact. Jackson and Caine wear their years proudly; there’s no vanity in their performance or their appearance. The couple’s eventual reunion is deep and real and, like their whole relationship, gorgeously ordinary.

Mahmood Mamdani, father of New York City’s Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, says his son’s drive is both innovative and uncompromising – and he is fully aware of the enormity of the job ahead.

A 1940 self-portrait titled ‘The dream’ by famed Mexican artist Frida Kahlo has sold for $54.7m, making it the most expensive work by a female artist to sell at auction.

Nov. 21 (UPI) — Federal authorities have arrested four people, including two Chinese nationals, on accusations of scheming to illegally export cutting-edge Nvidia technology with artificial intelligence uses to Beijing, which prosecutors said seeks to be the AI world leader by the end of the decade.

Federal authorities in Tampa, Fla., on Wednesday arrested 34-year-old Hong Kong-born U.S. citizen Hong Ning Ho, also known as Matthew Ho, and 45-year-old Jing Chen, also known as Harry Chen, who was in the United States on a F-1 nonimmigrant student visa.

Brian Curtis Raymond, 46, of Huntsville, Ala., and 38-year-old Cham Li, also know as Tony Li, a Chinese national, were also arrested, though when was not clear.

Federal prosecutors alleged in an indictment — unsealed Wednesday but publicized by the Justice Department on Thursday — that from September 2023 until their arrests, the defendants conspired to illegally export NVIDIA graphics processing units to China through Malaysia and Thailand.

“The indictment unsealed yesterday alleges a deliberate and deceptive effort to transship controlled NVIDIA GPUs to China by falsifying paperwork, creating fake contracts and misleading U.S. authorities,” John Eisenberg, assistant attorney general for National Security said in a statement.

The court documents statement that they attempted four separate exports consisting of hundreds of GPUs. The first two shipments saw 400 Nvidia A100 GPUs being exported to China between October 2024 and January. The other two shipments of 50 Nvidia H200 GPUs and 10 Hewlett Packard Enterprises supercomputers with Nvidia H100 GPUS were intercepted by authorities.

In return for the shipments, the defendants allegedly received more than $3.89 million in wire transfers, according to the indictment.

The indictment states they used Tampa-based Janford Realtor, owned by Ho and Li, as a front company to buy the goods and export them to China.

Federal prosecutors alleged that despite being labeled a real estate company, it was involved involved in property transactions.

The court document accuses Raymond of supply the GPUs to Ho through his Alabama-based electronics company.

According to federal prosecutors, China is seeking to become the world leader in AI by 2030 and seeks to use the technology for military modernization efforts, including designing and testing its weapons of mass destruction as well as surveillance tools.

RUFUS WAINWRIGHT has never been an artist to repeat himself.

With a diverse back catalogue, the Canadian singer’s latest project sees him dive into the world of Kurt Weill with the Pacific Jazz Orchestra, releasing an album following a string of concerts.

I’m A Stranger Here Myself: Wainwright Does Weill is a richly dramatic and stylish collection that breathes new life into the German composer’s timeless songs from the 1920s-40s.

Rufus tells Jacqui Swift about finding new meaning in the music and why now felt like the right moment to record it . . . 

WHEN did you first hear Kurt Weill songs, and which means the most?
I first heard his songs after buying an album I saw in a record store when I was about 13 that looked super cool.

It was a funky lady, smoking a cigarette with a big smile. That was Kurt Weill’s wife Lotte Lenya [the album was called Lotte Lenya Sings American Theatre Songs Of Kurt Weill].

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So it was really Lotte’s picture that got me going first.

Surabaya Johnny is my favourite Kurt Weill song. It’s a song I wish I’d written.

How did his songs influence your own writing and performance?
He was a fan of drama and atmosphere – two elements which I definitely incorporate in my own work.

And I love how he’s willing to tackle the troubling subjects of the day, something I’ve never shied away from.

How do you approach a song like Mack The Knife and make it your own?
My strategy was to combine the German version and the Bobby Darin version to have a kind of mid-Atlantic version.

I don’t usually have trouble with that, because my voice is so bizarre that everything I sing always ends up sounding like a Rufus Wainwright song.

Did any song surprise you once you started working on its arrangement?
It Never Was You was a song I always overlooked and felt it just didn’t touch me.

But certainly, after my mother passed away I looked at it in a whole new light.

How are you balancing staying true to Weill while bringing your own personality and style?
The thing about this whole project is that it’s great, but it’s also incredibly tragic.

Kurt Weill died at 50. I started doing these songs and performing them professionally when I was 50.

In a lot of ways, I feel like I’m transferring a lot of his spirit into his latter days, an age that he wasn’t able to really experience.

So I feel responsible for giving him a little bit more time on the earth.

When did you realise your live performance of these songs should be an album?
Really, when we got there, after we heard the recordings.

None of this was ever intended to be a record.

We all just did it off the cuff and decided to record it last minute.

But once we listened to the tracks, we realised that there was something really special there, especially considering that the songs were written during a very troubling time politically.

This is a good moment to put that type of material out, since we are also in deep water at the moment.

How did the Pacific Jazz Orchestra come on board?
They made the initial offer. I had sung some Kurt Weill songs at the Carlyle Hotel in New York for a small residency.

Then they came to me and said, ‘You know, we’d love to do something with you. Anything’.

And I put two and two together.

Your back catalogue is diverse and varied. Where does this work fit in?
I consider my catalogue, my career and my life, in many ways, to be a tree that has many, many branches.

I would say this is connected to it.

Let’s say this is a sprouting flower from a twig.

Was this one of your most challenging projects?
It was, but mainly because I was doing so much around it.

I was producing a musical in the West End called Opening Night and also putting the finishing touches on my Dream Requiem, which was to be premiered in Paris after this concert.

So yeah, I was spread super, super thin, and it was incredibly challenging, but that adds a manic energy to the performance, which works well with his material.

You can’t be too rested when you sing Kurt Weill.

What’s next?
I’m shutting down the shop. I’m 100 per cent working on a new pop record.

I need to go back to my bread and butter and see what the kids are up to and take one more swipe at it.

You played Want One and Want Two for BBC Proms, was that night as special for you as it was for the audience?
Yeah, it’s always special doing those records.

They represent such a pivotal moment in my life and they really made me who I am today.

Any more special performances of these albums in the future?
I’ll do one periodically, here and there, for sure.

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I’m doing the Judy Garland record in June at the Royal Albert Hall so, yeah, I’m still pretty schizophrenic musically.

RUFUS WAINWRIGHT WITH THE PACIFIC JAZZ ORCHESTRA

I’m A Stranger Here Myself: Wainwright Does Weill

★★★★☆

Preliminary investigations show a gas leak triggered the explosion, which also flattened nearby homes, authorities say.

An explosion at a glue-making factory in Pakistan has killed at least 16 people and injured seven after it collapsed the factory and sparked fires in nearby homes, Pakistani media are reporting.

The blast occurred at about 5am local time (00:00 GMT) on Friday in the Malikpur area of Faisalabad, west of Lahore in Punjab province.

Preliminary investigations showed a gas leak inside the factory’s chemical warehouse triggered the explosion, local outlets reported, citing Faisalabad Commissioner Raja Jahangir Anwar.

Authorities arrested the factory manager but were still searching for the owner, who fled shortly after the incident.

The blast flattened the factory’s roof and those of a handful of nearby homes, causing fires to break out in at least three of them, according to Pakistani channel Aaj TV. Photos published by the channel showed flames leaping up from a central blast site and rescue crews crowding into the interior of a burning building.

The majority of those killed were residents from adjacent homes, including six children, authorities said.

Rescue crews searched for and dug people out of piles of rubble, according to TV channel Geo News. The seven injured people were receiving treatment at a nearby hospital.

Factory fires are not uncommon in the country. In 2024, an explosion at a textile mill in Faisalabad killed a dozen people, while a blast at a firecracker factory in Karachi killed four people and injured 11 more last week.

Nigeria remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world for students.

Being a student in Nigeria is like life on the shifting sand. One of the victims of the famous Chibok abduction of 2014, Amina Ali, still recalls that shift: “One minute we were students, the next we were running, unsure of where safety was. What stays with me most is the fear in everyone’s eyes … that feeling that life had just taken a turn I could never prepare for.”

A decade after Amina and 275 other schoolgirls were abducted from their hostels in the country’s North East, sparking the global #BringBackOurGirls campaign, the violence that began as an extremist campaign against Western education has transformed into a multi-million-naira kidnapping industry affecting both public and private schools.

This tragic pattern repeated itself in Kebbi State on Monday, Nov. 17, where terrorists abducted at least 25 students of Government Girls’ Comprehensive Secondary School in Maga, Danko/Wasagu Local Government Area. The school’s Security Master, Hassan Yakubu, and Aliyu Shehu, a night watchguard, were killed in the attack. One of the students escaped during the abduction. 

The Chief of Army Staff has since directed troops to intensify rescue efforts — a move that highlights, yet again, how overstretched security forces currently are in responding to the surge in school-targeted abductions and other forms of criminality.

But even as the search continues, the wider picture remains grim. A HumAngle review of verified media reports and investigations by human rights organisations shows that at least 1,880 students have been abducted or killed across Nigeria between 2014 and 2025.

These attacks have devastated communities across the country, especially in the North, and symbolise the collapse of security in spaces that should nurture the country’s future. From the ideological terror of Boko Haram in Yobe and Borno to the ransom-driven criminality of terrorist groups in Zamfara, Kaduna, and Niger, schools have become soft targets in a nation that has failed to learn from each tragedy.

The forgotten beginning 

Yet before the Chibok abduction shocked the world, there was Buni Yadi — a quiet town in Yobe State that witnessed one of the most gruesome assaults on education in Nigeria’s recent history. On the night of February 25, 2014, Boko Haram stormed the Federal Government College, Buni Yadi, killing 29 male students as they slept.

HumAngle’s earlier reporting reconstructed the night through survivor accounts: dormitories set ablaze, gunmen shouting “Allahu Akbar”, and teenagers trapped in locked hostels consumed by fire and bullets. 

It was a deliberate massacre — not for ransom, not for negotiation — but to send a message that “Western education is forbidden”. The world barely noticed. Two months later, Boko Haram struck again, this time abducting 276 schoolgirls from Chibok.

Buni Yadi, therefore, stands as the forgotten beginning of Nigeria’s school-terror era — an early signal of what would follow when ideological war met state neglect. One of the boys who survived, Mohammed Ibrahim, would eventually graduate from Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University in Bauchi State. His journey underscores how survival is not an end but the start of a long struggle to reclaim education and self. Mohammed did not have an easy time going back to school after his experience of the massacre. 

“Honestly, after the incidents, I hated school,” he said. “Many things contributed to the attack. Firstly, there was a lack of security. Before the incident, there was no single security personnel in the area; they said they would provide, but none were around. They took away the ones operating in the area; people were saying that it means there was no safety since they took away the security personnel in the area.”

From ideology to industry

Six years after the Buni Yadi and Chibok incident, armed groups and terrorists in Nigeria’s North West realised that abducting students brought instant ransom, political leverage, and media attention. What began as religious fundamentalism had by then morphed into an extortionist criminal enterprise.

In December 2020, the first large-scale operation of this kind happened at Government Science Secondary School Kankara, where 344 boys were abducted from their school dormitories by terrorists. Within days, video footage surfaced showing the terrified boys surrounded by their abductors, who pledged allegiance to Boko Haram — a claim later linked to a loosely affiliated terrorist faction.

That single event inspired copycat kidnappings across the region: Jangebe (Zamfara, 2021), Kagara (Niger, 2021), Tegina (Niger, 2021), and Birnin Yauri (Kebbi, 2021).

In Birnin Yauri, the day began like any other exam morning. Rebecca James, one of the abducted students, said she was 30 minutes into writing her paper for the day, Financial Accounting, when the first sounds came — distant gunshots, shouts, and the sudden rush of feet. “I was confused because it sounded strange,” she recalled.

As the students scrambled for safety, Rebecca tried to find her sisters in the chaos, but a teacher ordered everyone back into the hall so they could be “in one place”. The gunshots, however, grew closer, and students hid in the side rooms until the main door was forced open. “They continued shooting guns — ceilings, everywhere — helter-skelter,” she said. The terrorists kicked down doors, dragged terrified students from hiding, and fired into windows, injuring at least one student in the leg before marching a group towards the gate and loading them into a white car. “Last last, we were kidnapped,” she summed up.

Unlike the ideological attacks of Boko Haram, many of these more recent operations are driven by ransom and carried out by local militia networks with deep knowledge of their terrain and communities. Yet for the children at the centre, the distinction between ideology and crass greed is irrelevant; in both cases, the classroom becomes a trap. And this trap is often sprung most brutally on girls.

Girls as primary targets

In school abduction incidents where gender data is available, girls accounted for nearly two-thirds of all abducted students. This imbalance stems mainly from the targeting of all-female schools — a pattern rooted in both ideological and exploitative motives. Key examples include:

• Chibok (2014) – 276 girls abducted by Boko Haram; 98 remain unaccounted for.
• Dapchi (2018) – 110 girls taken, Leah Sharibu remains in captivity.
• Jangebe (2021) – 279 girls kidnapped, later released after government negotiation.

For girls like Rebecca, gender was explicitly weaponised. During her captivity, she remembers being told that their abductors would hold onto the girls because they were “more important than the male” — more valuable for ransom and more painful for families to lose. “They were saying we are the female ones … they said that the female ones, if they stayed long in a place, parents will feel more,” she said. 

Rebecca and other girls were also forcefully married off during captivity. They suffered repeated sexual abuse that led to some of them, one as young as 14, getting pregnant and giving birth. Even after their release, the terror group reached out, wanting the babies returned to them.

In contrast, the Kankara and Birnin Yauri abductions targeted boys’ or mixed schools, indicating that while both genders are vulnerable, female students face compounded risks — sexual violence, forced marriage, and sex trafficking.

The gendered nature of these attacks has left deep scars on communities, where parents now weigh the risks of educating daughters against the supposed safety of keeping them at home. 

For some survivors, the experience has hardened their resolve to fight back through education itself. Rebecca, who was once an accounting student, has switched to the arts with a clear goal: “I changed … just to study law,” she explained, adding that it will enable her to defend the vulnerable, especially girls. 

Geographical spread and shifting threats

In 2014, attacks on schools were primarily confined to the North East — Borno and Yobe — under the shadow of Boko Haram. By 2020, they had shifted westward to the North West and North Central regions, reflecting the fragmentation of armed groups and the spread of insecurity.

This expansion reshaped the threat landscape:

• North East (Boko Haram and ISWAP): Attacks driven by ideology, targeting state education systems and female students.
• North West (terrorists and armed groups): Abductions motivated by ransom, tribal vendettas, and power projection.
• North Central, especially in Niger and Kaduna: Mixed motives — ransom, political signalling, and territorial assertion.

This diffusion of violence has complicated response strategies. Each zone now faces a different kind of threat, with varying ideological, economic, and criminal drivers — all converging on the same target: students. 

For many pupils in rural areas, this unpredictability shapes daily life, as rumours of an impending attack now spread as fast as exam timetables. 

“Anytime students hear about terrorists, they should not doubt whether they are coming or not,” Rebecca advised. “They should immediately leave such areas and go back to their homes for safety, not waiting until they see the terrorists  with their own eyes.”

The human cost

Every figure in the tally masks a story of trauma. Survivors of Buni Yadi, Chibok, Dapchi, Birnin Yauri, and Kuriga describe recurring nightmares, social stigma, and broken dreams. For some, school can no longer be taken for granted. 

“Education used to feel simple — just books, teachers, friends,” Amina said. “But, after the attack, I now see my future as something I must fight for … I want to prove that what happened will not destroy the dreams I still carry inside me.”

Rebecca echoes that determination, but channels it into a specific ambition. Her anger is directed at what she sees as terrorists who wield more firepower than the state. “These terrorists have guns more powerful than military personnel here in Nigeria, which makes it the government’s fault,” she said. Her response was to lean harder into school, not away from it: “The incident made me more eager to read and learn about my country.”

Many who returned found their schools destroyed or abandoned. Some struggle with reintegration, unable to sit in classrooms without flashbacks. Others, particularly girls who bore children in captivity, face rejection from their families and communities.

Hafsat Bello, a counsellor working with young students in northern Nigeria, said: “The school, which was once seen as a means to a brighter future, is now viewed to be the most dangerous place for students. Children with dreams so beautiful now fear the very garden where their dreams would bloom. The biggest gap is that the Safe Schools Initiative is still largely theoretical in many communities. Policies exist on paper, but implementation is weak and inconsistent.”

In many of these communities, enrolment has dropped dramatically. UNICEF estimates that over 10.5 million Nigerian children are out of school, with the majority concentrated in the North, where insecurity is a leading driver. 

In 2014, the Safe Schools Initiative (SSI) was launched to prevent the collapse of schools. More than $20 million was pledged by donors and had all been received as of 2o20. The initiative was managed through the Nigeria Safe Schools Initiative Multi-Donor Trust Fund, which was overseen by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) for contributions, disbursements, and project implementation.

The funds were used for various projects, including the construction of fences, classrooms, and the provision of emergency communication tools. 

However, the implementation of these projects was uneven. While some urban and semi-urban schools benefited, many rural schools still lacked basic safety infrastructure, according to a 2021 report by the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS) and the Development Research and Projects Centre (dRPC). 

The report noted that many schools were still without perimeter fencing, trained guards, and emergency response systems. A steering committee, which included representatives from both donor organisations and the government, audited the SSI project to determine its efficacy. Although financial statements were made available, the NILDS-dRPC report revealed notable deficiencies in monitoring and accountability. The report shows that many projects did not undergo independent audits and that there was a lack of transparency regarding the allocation of funds at the state and local levels. 

“For this initiative to truly work, every school must have real physical protection, early-warning and rapid-alert systems, continuous emergency-response training, and a transparent accountability system that tracks how safety funds are used,” said Hafsat.

For Nura Suleiman, the Vice Principal (Academic) at Government Girls Secondary School (GGSS) Jangebe, Zamfara State, the scars of abduction and violence against schoolchildren are beyond emotional trauma, as it has dampened the morale of pupils towards education.

“From my experience, abduction and attacks affected students’ willingness to return to classrooms negatively,” Suleiman told HumAngle. “Especially in the rural northern communities where most of the students ran out of the school.”

The 2021 mass abduction of schoolgirls from Jangebe remains a haunting reminder of the vulnerability of Nigeria’s educational institutions. Despite the launch of the Safe Schools Initiative, Suleman believes the gaps remain vivid due to poor implementation.

“The practical steps which could make schools genuinely safer are to stop insurgency in the country by any means,” he said. “I mean either by fighting or negotiation.”

Suleiman emphasised that school safety encompasses more than just physical infrastructure. He explained that proper safety can only be achieved when students, teachers, and communities feel secure in their environment. 

The principal noted that his school has made efforts to boost students’ morale and encourage their return to the classrooms. In collaboration with the NEEM Foundation, a leading crisis response organisation working with individuals and communities affected by violence, GGSS Jangebe’s Guidance and Counselling department provides mental health support to students who have survived abduction. 

Yet the Jangebe experience also underscores a broader pattern: the support offered to survivors varies sharply from one case to another, leaving many children without the continuity of care they need.

Uneven support, unequal recovery

What happens after rescue reflects this inconsistency. For some, like Rebecca, there has been a rare attempt at comprehensive care.

On her return from captivity, she and other released students were taken to the hospital for medical treatment and meals, then eventually placed in placements in what she calls “the best and most expensive school in Nigeria”. She describes feeling “special every day because of what they have done for us,” noting that the authorities provide a pocketful of stuff and check in on their health.

Crucially, she says, they were encouraged to believe it was not too late to restart school after two lost years. Counsellors and guardians stressed that “age is just a number” and that education remained open to them if they chose it. She repeatedly cites the role of a mentor she calls ‘Brother Celine’, who helped them return to the classroom. “I cannot stop thanking the government for everything they have done for us,” she said.

Amina’s post-rescue experience tells a different story. For her, life after returning has been, in her words, “a mix of hope and struggle”. Some organisations offered counselling, tuition, or basic supplies, but she and many other Chibok survivors still feel like they are rebuilding essentially on their own: “The emotional healing, the financial challenges, the need for real protection — these things are still not fully met. We are grateful for any help, but there is still a long road ahead.” 

The contrast between these two trajectories — one shaped by sustained, structured support, the other by patchy assistance and lingering vulnerability — mirrors the broader inconsistency of Nigeria’s approach. Where you were abducted from, which government was in power, which NGO took an interest, and how much media attention your case drew can determine how fully you are allowed to rebuild your life.

Lessons from a decade of failure

The testimonies of survivors sharpen the picture that the statistics already suggest. 

The Buni Yadi massacre, for example, was an early alarm that signalled a war on education, yet the failure to strengthen school protections afterwards allowed abductions to spread with little resistance. As the crisis deepened, a ransom economy took root. Kidnappings became a lucrative enterprise in which armed groups in Zamfara and Kaduna negotiated openly, collecting payments that financed further attacks and entrenched the cycle.

These dynamics have been worsened by persistent security gaps. Response times remain slow, intelligence sharing between states and federal forces is inconsistent, and rural policing is largely absent. Former hostages notice that their captors often carry superior firepower. “How will a terrorist have a more powerful gun and bullets than soldiers in the military?” Rebecca asked rhetorically—a question that has agitated many Nigerians.

At the policy level, the gaps are just as stark. Nigeria endorsed the Safe Schools Declaration in 2015, yet implementation in the states most affected remains minimal, leaving the lessons of Chibok and Birnin Yauri largely unheeded. 

Gender adds another layer of vulnerability: female students are singled out both ideologically and practically. Rebecca’s recollection that girls were kept because parents “feel more for females” exposes the calculated use of daughters as leverage. 

All of this feeds into a profound erosion of trust. Each attack deepens scepticism about the state’s ability—or willingness—to protect its citizens, weakening the community cooperation that early-warning signals depend on. 

Even where authorities appear to have learnt some operational lessons, such as closing schools pre-emptively when threats arise, the underlying issues of rural insecurity, corruption, and impunity remain largely untouched.

And the consequences of those unresolved failures are visible not only in testimonies and statistics, but also from above. Satellite imagery shows that these classrooms were stolen. It captures a timeline of destruction, militarisation, and neglect that follow these school attacks.

FGC Buni Yadi remains a shadow of its former self. In 2010, it appeared as a modest rural school; by March 2015, the satellite pass captured the aftermath of the massacre — burnt buildings and scorched earth where children once learned. Reconstruction began around late 2018, yet the compound stands today as a restored shell, a reminder that almost everything was set ablaze.

Although GGSS Chibok was not torched, it lost its educational purpose to humanitarian needs after the incident. Over the decade, the school became a shelter for survivors rather than students. The surrounding town is militarised with defensive trenches, and the school vicinity is filled with tents

A similar fate met GSC Kagara. Satellite views show the school ringed by trenches, turning an academic environment into a militarised space.

The warning visible at FGC Birnin Yauri remains unsettling. Unlike other locations where defences appeared after the tragedy, imagery shows this landscape was encircled by trenches long before the abduction. This proves, as reported, that the community lived under the threat well before the attack happened.

For LGEA Kuriga, the view from space captures the slow impact of neglect. There are no burnt structures, but the gradual decay of roofing sheets and fading paint testify to fear-induced neglect. GGSS Jangebe reflects the same pattern: from above, the compound looks orderly, yet ground-level footage — including scenes from a BBC Africa Eye documentary — shows shattered windows, damaged doors, and stripped classrooms. It appears intact only from a distance.

A few affected schools, such as Greenfield University, GSSS Kankara, and Dapchi, bear no visible scars from space. No scorched earth or defensive trenches. Their normal appearance is misleading, showing that the most profound scars of Nigeria’s mass school abductions often lie beyond what satellites can record.

A nation still unprepared

Despite years of promises, Nigeria remains reactive rather than proactive in matters of insecurity. Officials still rush to the scenes of abductions, issue statements of condemnation, and announce task forces — only for the cycle to repeat months later.

In communities like Buni Yadi, buildings have been reconstructed, but the psychological wounds remain. Survivors grow into adulthood carrying invisible wounds, while new students study under the same shadow of fear.

The Kuriga abduction of March 2024, in which 227 pupils were taken, shows that little has changed. Although 137 were eventually rescued, the incident underscores how unprotected rural schools remain — and how quickly armed groups can strike, even with military presence nearby. 

For survivors such as Mohammed Ibrahim, simply graduating from university is an act of quiet defiance. For Amina and Rebecca, returning to the classroom and choosing careers in law or public service is a way of pushing back against those who tried to silence them.

But their determination does not diminish the responsibility of the state; it underscores it. Amina offers a clear warning to those in power: “Do not wait until it happens again … protect those schools like your own children are inside them.”

She believes Nigeria has learnt “some lessons, but not enough”. Continued reports of attacks and abductions, like the recent incident in Kebbi, reinforce this for her. “Until schools in every region are safe, until security becomes a priority and not a reaction, the risks will continue,” she said.

Na’empere Daniel, who survived the Birnin Yauri abduction alongside Rebecca after years in captivity, has similar thoughts. “Sometimes, it feels like Nigeria hasn’t fully learned from what happened to us,” she said. “Our pain should have changed things, but many students are still living through the same fear. No one deserves to experience what we went through.”

The violence has evolved, but the state’s response has barely shifted. Until education is treated as a security priority rather than a social service, the classrooms of northern Nigeria will remain haunted by ghosts of unprotected children.

The question now is not whether it will happen again, but when and to whom it will happen. Survivors like Rebecca and Amina have done their part: they remember the gunshots in the exam hall, the fear in their classmates’ eyes, the long nights of captivity — and they have turned those memories into vocal demands for justice and protection.

Whether Nigeria listens — and acts — will determine if the next generation can learn without fear, or if more of its classrooms will be stolen.

To make learning more resilient, Hafsat Bello, the counsellor who works with young students, stresses the need to adapt education to current realities. She highlights the importance of flexible learning models, noting that “in conflict zones, learning should not stop simply because the physical school is unsafe,” suggesting mobile classrooms, community hubs, radio lessons, or temporary safe spaces to keep children engaged.

Hafsat also underscores trauma-informed teaching, explaining that teachers need training to recognise signs of trauma and adjust their approach, because “a child who has witnessed violence will not learn the same way as a child who feels safe.” She emphasises that every school, particularly in high-risk areas, must have clear emergency response plans in addition to standard timetables.

Teachers themselves require protection and support, including emotional care, hazard allowances, and a sense of security, as their stability directly impacts students’ learning. She further calls for strong collaboration between schools, security agencies, and communities, stressing that education cannot operate in isolation and must be supported consistently, not only after attacks.

“Education must evolve to meet the reality of the children we serve. If we want to protect their futures, then resilience must be built into the system, not as an afterthought, but as a priority,” the counsellor added.